Tag: march

Shadow of the Sun

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Kapuscinski, Ryszard. Shadow of the Sun. Translated by Klara Glowczewska. Alfred A. Knopf, 2001.

Reason read: Kapuscinski celebrated a birthday on March 4th. Read in his honor.

The forty years of experiences of Ryszard Kapuscinski in Africa will excite and amaze readers. He shows a rare and profoundly deep respect for the cultures of the regions in which he traveled. As apparent in Shadow of the Sun, Kapuscinski writes in stunning clarity, whether it be describing trying to navigate a vehicle through a traffic jam of sleepy buffalo or watching mustached cockroaches the size of small turtles; killing a cobra sleeping in a roadside hut or holding his breath while an elephant meanders through camp. Even tackling more serious topics like Uganda’s decolonization and ultimate independence, the coup in Zanzibar, or the Tutsi/Hutu conflict is articulated with grace and respect.
Speaking of the Tutsi/Hutu conflict, a side note. I never thought about ideological training as a part of warfare. It is not widely discussed as a boot camp topic, but it makes sense. You need to indoctrinate your subordinates because it was clever to have every Rwandan Tutsi citizen guilty of murder; a crime committed by the masses.
They say the best artists suffer for their art. Kapuscinski has been jailed for his curiosity over forty times. He contracted cerebral malaria, which sounds pretty bad until you add tuberculosis to the mix.

As an aside, Francoise Huguier’s photograph for the cover of Shadow of the Sun is stunning.

Confessional: while reading Shadow of the Sun and Among the Believers I was getting myself confused with which book was which.

Quote that stopped me, “With each step I lose my confidence” (p 42). Been there. Here is another, there is nothing worse than this state of being neither at war nor at peace” (p 178).

Author fact: at the age of seventeen Kapuscinski wanted to be a poet. How does someone so young know they want to be a poet?

Book trivia: portions of Shadow of the Sun were previously published in the New Yorker.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “Africa: Today and Yesterday” (p 9).

Last Bongo Sunset

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Plesko, Les. Last Bongo Sunset. Simon & Schuster, 1995..

Reason read: Read in honor of Kerouac’s birth month. He was born on March 12th, 1922. I don’t know if this is some kind of sign, but no library in my area had a physical copy of Last Bongo Sunset. I had to read it online. Not entirely horrible.

Within two days of quitting school in Boston, and arriving in Venice Beach, a protagonist only known as “College” has met and befriended pimp Gary, and his girlfriend/prostitute, Cassandra. Gary has Cassandra hanging out of College’s window by her ankles. No idea how or why they got into his apartment, but three hours later, though, College is sharing the needle and popping his heroine cherry with them. His lily white track-free arms will never be the same. A little while later along comes barely twelve year old Maria to join the fun. Maria, on the run herself, is recruited to earn money for the group. The days blur together in a never-ending cycle of hustling for cash, indulging in meaningless sex, and sinking into a drug filled oblivion. Despite College getting bored with the cycle there is a sticky sheen of hopelessness which no one can wipe clean. The book ends with a glimmer of hope as empty as a sunny day in Venice Beach.
There was a level of intimacy with not only the drugs, but the act of using. Every aspect of shooting meth is explained with enough detail (like the rolling of veins that make it difficult for the needle to hit) to make me squirm.

There were moments of brilliant writing: “smeared his relief” – an action and a feeling. I don’t think I need to spell out the action or the subsequent feeling.

Dated marketing that helps orientate the reader to the era: Brylcreem, Ford Fairlane, Hank Aaron, Babe Ruth, Apollo 15,

Author fact: Plesko has written a few books but I am only reading Last Bongo Sunset for the Challenge.

Book trivia: cover art for Last Bongo Sunset is a bit weird. On the left hand side is a photograph of a tattoo. The tattoo is of a skeleton wearing a mohawk with blood dripping from it’s jaw. It might have a forked tongue? The right hand side is a photograph of a palm tree with some clouds in an oval.

Music: Led Zeppelin, Bobby Sherman, Schumann, Beatles, Sinatra, Tammy Wynette, Chopin’s Barcarolle, “Dead Flowers”, “Maggie May”, Grateful Dead, Mel Torme, Cat Stevens, Neil Young, Connie Francis, Judy Garland, “Put Your Head on My Shoulder”, “Clare de Lune”, “Stairway to Heaven”, and Lucia di Lammermoor.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “California Here We Come” (p 50).

Some Buried Caesar

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Stout, Rex. Some Buried Caesar. Bantam Books, 1938.

Reason read: to continue the series started in November.

It takes a lot to get Nero Wolfe to leave his New York brownstone apartment. As a self proclaimed recluse, food and flowers are his favorite indoor pastimes. He can devote a lot of time and attention to both without ever having to leave home. In Some Buried Caesar it is the chance to showcase his prize albino orchids at an update New York exhibition that draws Wolfe and his sidekick, Archie Goodwin, out of the apartment and out of the city. However, a blown tire and subsequent tangle with a tree leave Wolfe and Goodwin stranded at the Pratt home. Since the Pratts own a farm out in the country, Wolfe and Goodwin are captive guests while the car is being repaired. Once settled at the house they learn their host, Tom Pratt, has an interesting stunt to promote his chain of restaurants. He plans to cook and serve a prized bull as the very expensive main attraction at a barbeque. Eating a bull named Hickory Caesar Grindson was never on Wolfe’s agenda. Murder was not on his mind as he waited for his car to be fixed, either. All he wanted was to show his orchids and go home. But when Hickory Caesar Grindson gores a rival neighbor to death, Wolfe knows there is a case to be solved.

As an aside, I found myself questioning details almost in the same manner as Wolfe. Was Miss Rowan a plant?

One way I am like Nero Wolfe, “I like to stay at home, and when I am away I like to get back” (p 122). Another commonality: did you ever notice that Wolfe barely smiles? He does a lot of muttering and sighing.

Author fact: Stout spent some time in Wakarusa, Kansas.

Book trivia: the introduction to Some Buried Caesar was written by Diane Mott Davidson.
Book trivia II: Davidson included a recipe for baked beans in her introduction. I’ll have to try them.
Book trivia III: my copy of Some Buried Caesar (#6 in the series) also included the story The Golden Spiders (#22 in the series).

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “Rex Stout’s Nero Wolfe: Too Good To Miss” (p 226).

Saving Ellen

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Casey, Maura. Saving Ellen: a Memoir. Skyhorse Publishing, Inc., 2025

Reason read: I am a member of the Early Review Program for LibraryThing. From time to time I get the chance to review interesting books. This is one of them.

On the surface, Saving Ellen is an intimate and intense dive into kidney disease. As an adolescent, Maura’s sister Ellen lost function of her kidneys. What follows in Saving Ellen is a series of medical appointments, hospital stays, prescriptions and side effects, a transplant, the hope of recovery by a large and chaotic Irish family that never gave up hope. At the heart of Saving Ellen is Casey’s relationship with life and everything good and bad that came with it. All the heartbreaks and triumphs of childhood. From coming of age and dealing with relentless bullying to watching an alcoholic parent poison his entire family with infidelity and addiction, Casey’s story is one of addiction survival, family forgiveness, grief acceptance, and ultimate love.
Set in New York’s city of Buffalo, I saw Saving Ellen as also a memoir of place. Buffalo in the late 1960s and early 1970s is like another impoverished character; struggling to live and breathe and grow up.

Confessional: I wish Casey had opened her memoir with the 5th and 6ths sentences as the very first sentences to Saving Ellen. They really pack a punch.

Author fact: even though Casey has written a few other books, I am not reading any of them.

Book trivia: Saving Ellen has a really cool cover.

Setlist: “One Fine Day”, “What a Frozen Little Hand”, Tommy Makem and the Clancy Brothers, Bach, Jean Sibelius, “We shall Overcome”, the Beatles, The Coors, the Monkees, the Mamas and the Papas, Mozart, Beethoven, Aaron Copeland’s “Appalachian Spring”, Rachmaninoff, Barry Manilow, “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot”, and “A Parting Glass”.

Confessional: If I hadn’t discovered Dermot Kennedy’s music I would not have found “A Parting Glass” when I did. It is a beautiful song.

Jemez Mountains

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Swetnam, Thomas W. The Jemez Mountains: a Cultural and Natural History. University of New Mexico Press, 2025.

Reason read: As a member of the Early Review Program for LibraryThing I get to review really cool books. This is one of them. I chose this book because I have long been fascinated with the Southwest. My sister has big dreams of settling in Taos, New Mexico. Me, I am not so sure.

There is a lot of love and respect in the pages of Jemez Mountains. It is abundantly clear that Swetnam cares deeply for the culture, history, and natural beauty of the region. He will take you to the hot springs that rival Saratoga’s. He will describe the first automobile in Jemez Springs. He will spend a lot of time at the Soda Dam. There are stories of bears, hippies, and abusive priests. He will give you a historical and scientific perspective of land use through the ages with photographs to illustrate each point. He has a serious concern about climate change and the damage it has already done to the region. There is a great deal of information packed in each essay so it was a relief when Swetnam explained that the essays of Jemez Mountains need not be read in sequential order.
As an aside, I felt a huge connection to Jemez Mountains not only because of my previously disclosed love of the Southwest, but because I uncovered other commonalities with the narrative. Swetnam matched photographs taken at the turn of the century with current ones. My hometown did something similar to illustrate how little it has changed in the last one hundred or so years. Swetnam refers to this matching of photographs as “then and now.” Inspired by the photography of my hometown, I put together an art show at my college with old photographs overlaid with current photographs and I called the project “Then and Now.”

Disclaimer: I make comments based on the assumption that special features to a book, like the same photographs, maps, or illustrations will be in the final published copy. That being said, the cover to Jemez Mountains is gorgeous. Swetnam has mentioned that there are more than one hundred photographs, maps, and drawings. My favorite photograph was of a Mack truck coming through one of the Guadalupe Box tunnels. It is impressive.

Book trivia: Jemez Mountains is set to be published in April 2025.

Author fact: Swetnam is a retired University of Arizona professor.

Small music: “O Fair New Mexico”

Hatwearer’s Lesson

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Joe, Yolanda. The Hatwearer’s Lesson. Plume, 2004.

Reason read: Yolanda Joe was born in March. Read in her honor.

When Grandmother Ollie speaks, her granddaughter, Terri, best sit up straight and listen with both ears wide open. Ms. Ollie knows a thing or two about life, love, and loss. When she couldn’t write Terri’s fiancé’s name (Derek) in her Bible she knew trouble was brewing. Terri might be a successful Chicago lawyer and one half of a gorgeous power couple soon to be married, but what is she to do when Grandmother says there is bad luck coming? Derek is wealthy, sexy, and smart. Terri, only thinking about image, cannot afford to lose Derek so she does what any practical woman would do. She ignores the mystical warnings. Terri thinks she has it all with her career and Derek, but her luck goes from bad to worse when first, she discovers her hunk of a boyfriend has been stepping out on her with a rival. Then her grandmother suffers a fall that lands Ollie in the hospital and in need of an operation. This health scare couldn’t come at a better time. Going back home to Alabama to care for Ollie gives Terri the much needed time away to clear her head. Except. What about her professional legal career? Will her absence jeopardize her place in the firm? She does have rivals sniffing around her clients. And what about her heart? Will she ever be able to trust Derek again? She has rivals sniffing around her man, too. Life becomes even more confusing when she meets an Alabama country boy who wears his heart on his sleeve and trustworthy honesty on his tongue.

Head scratcher: correct me if I am wrong, but I do not think you need to block your number when calling from a cell phone. No one will know if you are standing in your own bathroom or at the North Pole when you make a call from a cell.

Author fact: I am reading four Joe books for the Challenge. I finished Bebe’s By Golly Wow. Still to go are He Say, She Say and This Just In.

Book trivia: According to Joe, hat wearer is one word: hatwearer. My spell checker hates me right now.

Playlist: Gladys Knight, James Brown, Bill “Bojangles” Robinson, Stevie Wonder, Sammy Davis Jr., Lena Horne, and Luther Vandross.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “African American Fiction: She Say” (p 12).

In Sicily

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Lewis, Norman. In Sicily. Thomas Dunne Books, 2000.

Reason read: there is an almond blossom festival that takes place every March in Sicily.

Norman Lewis fell in love with Sicily and its environs in the mid 1950s. In Sicily is a remembrance of that long-gone era. The mafia does not have the grip it once had, but Lewis has his memories and heartbreaks tied up in the violence and terror of wartime yesteryear. He married a mob daughter, after all. Sicily is a place of long-held corruption; of falling down palaces and open-air lovemaking and Lewis does not miss a single detail. In Sicily is an open love letter, full of crime, mythology, superstition, and passion.

As an aside, Lewis reported that Italians have a difficult time pronouncing the letter H. I can attest to that. My friend, born and raised in Rome, cannot pronounce my name.
Another aside. I am in love with the Dancing Satyr of Mazara. It’s now on my bucket list.

Quote to respect, “There are many lessons to be learned, the first being that as a black he had become invisible” (p 125).

Author fact: Lewis wrote a bunch of interesting books. I am reading a total of five of them for the Challenge.

Book trivia: the dedication is surprising. I have not seen one of its kind before.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the simple chapter called “Sicily” (p 209).

Deep Blue Good-By

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MacDonald, John D. The Deep Blue Good-By. Fawcett Gold Medal, 1964.

Reason read: Florida became a state on March 3rd, 1845.

Travis McGee lives on a 52′ barge-like houseboat docked in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. His occupation is to recover items for people from time to time; whenever he needs the cash or is bored. Sort of like a freelance detective or repo man without structure. In a nutshell, McGee’s friend Chookie knows of a girl who needs help recovering something. She starts with the fact that her daddy went to prison for killing a man. While there David Berry divulged to his cellmate, Junior Allen, that he stole something of great worth. After David dies the cellmate is released from prison. He does the only thing a criminal fresh out of prison can do; he makes a beeline for the daughter’s residence to see if he can take possession of the stolen goods for himself. But first he has to completely traumatize a few women along the way. McGee does not know what the items are or where they might be. What he does know is that women should not be treated that way. In addition to getting the items back he wants to make the guy pay for brutalizing the fairer sex. What follows is a convoluted mix of violence, brainwashing, womanizing, and Florida sunshine. McGee is a flawed good guy who has his moments.

Quote I liked, “And I do not function on emotional motivation” (p 19).

As an aside, I would like to see his Rolls Royce that had been converted into a pickup truck.

Author fact: Macdonald wrote two books on my Challenge list: Only Girl in the Game (October 2036) and The Deep Blue Good-by.

Book trivia: Almost all of MacDonald’s books have a color in the title.

BookLust Twist: from More Book Lust in the chapter called “Florida Fiction” (p 89). It must be said that on the cover of MacDonald’s book the title reads, The Deep Blue Good-By. Not Goodbye.

Lee’s Lieutenants: Volume 2

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Freeman, Douglas Southall. Lee’s Lieutenants: A Study in Command. Volume Two: Cedar Mountain to Chancellorsville. Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1946.

Reason read: to continue the series started in January in honor of Lee’s birth month.

Whenever I read Douglas Southall Freeman’s books my senses come alive. In my mind’s eye, I can see the battlefields and the courage of young soldiers. I can hear the cannons volleying across enemy lines; the men yelling their battle cries. I can smell gunpowder, blood and mud. The campaigns from Cedar Mountain to Chancellorsville took place between 1862 and 1863. I can feel the pounding of the horse artillery’s hooves. I swear I can taste the victories and losses as Freeman describes every detail. Like Freeman’s first volume, Manassas to Mulvern Hill, Cedar Mountain to Chancellorsville is a minute by minute, battle by battle recounting of the Civil War. Every detail is well researched and described; using military papers, scrapbooks, memoirs, letters and official correspondence, court martial orders, and diaries and journals. A great deal of the narrative relies on Thomas Jonathan “Stonewall” Jackson’s journals and official papers. As an aside, one of the most difficult passages to read was the death of “Stonewall” Jackson after his amputation. He had just become a new father and was well respected by his troops. his death was a blow to Robert E. Lee’s armies.
As another aside, Can you imagine being saved from a sure death by a hardened biscuit, baked without salt or fat, that caught and stopped a bullet meant for your heart?

Author fact: I just discovered that Freeman was born in 1886. The end of the Civil War was not that long before his birth. I imagine he heard a great deal about the conflict growing up.

Book trivia: As with volume one, Cedar Mountain to Chancellorsville has great black and white portraits of some of the soldiers.

Music: “Old Joe Hooker”.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “Civil War Nonfiction” (p 58).

In the Rose Garden of the Martyrs

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De Bellaigue, Christopher. In the Rose Garden of the Martyrs: a Memoir of Iran. Harper Collins, 2005.

Reason read: Iran celebrates its new year in March.

In the Rose Garden of the Martyrs made me want to travel through the Middle East if only to see the Rose Garden of the Martyrs, the seven thousand graves, each with a photograph of the dead man buried below. That must be an impressive sight.
Through riding in a taxi and listening to the radio De Bellaigue offers up a snapshot of current events: Saddam’s activities burning oil wells in Kuwait, Colin Powell’s outward facing response to send more troops in aground campaign without telling the public what that really means. And speaking of taxis, what is it about taxi drivers? They are by turns an opportunity for confession and a source of information. There are little Easter egg surprises within In the Rose Garden of the Martyrs. The mini explanation of Rumi’s birth into the world of poetry was one such treasure. The personal details of how De Bellaigue met and courted his wife, Bita. Speaking of De Bellaigue’s wife and in-laws, I had to wonder how his personal life with them altered his journalistic approach to writing In the Rose Garden of the Martyrs. The language was far more introspective and dare I say romantic?

As an aside, when De Bellaigue said some characters were a compilation of more than one person I instantly thought of Natalie Merchant’s Miss Tilly. Merchant created Miss Tilly from a variety of strong women she has known throughout her life.
As another aside, there is a point where De Bellaigue succinctly describes the premise of a show called “The Good Place.” Tell me if this doesn’t sound familiar, “At the end of our lives we must compile a log of our activities and present it to the authorities. Points are totted. Heaven, Purgatory, or hell; you go to one, and your performance on Earth determines which” (p 66).
Final aside, Here is the menu for a 1971 dinner in the ruins of Persepolis:

  • Raw camel (carpaccio camel?)
  • Stuffed quail eggs
  • Caspian caviar
  • Lamb with truffles
  • Roast peacock

Author fact: Christopher De Bellaigue has his own website here.

Playlist: Led Zeppelin, Tarkan, Ibrahim, Shirley Bassey, and Googoosh.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the obvious chapter called “Iran” (p 108).

Vindication of the Rights of Woman

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Wollstonecraft, Mary. A Vindication of the Rights of Woman: with Strictures on Political and Moral Subjects. Source Book Press, 1971.

Reason read: March is Women’s History Month and International Women’s Day was last Marth 8th. Read in honor of all women everywhere.

A Vindication of the Rights of Woman was originally published in 1792. Nearly 180 years later when Source Book Press republished it, women were still clamoring for those rights. Title IX of the Education Amendments wasn’t even a thing until 1972. Think about that for just one second. In 1792 Wollstonecraft was demanding justice for her half of the human race as loudly as she could. Hers was a plea for all womenkind and not a singular selfish act of only thinking of herself. She argued that reason, virtue, and knowledge were the keys to a successful life regardless of your sex. However, the notion that physical strength promotes power indicates a man’s authority over a weaker woman exists even today. To put it crudely, inequality among the sexes is still a thing. To be sentimental is to be silly.
Wollstonecraft was not afraid to challenge her readers, asking us what does it mean to be respectable? To have virtue? To be a woman of quality? Are these traits euphemisms for weakness? She addresses the assumption that women are designed to feel before applying reason. Maybe that is why men are trained to never argue with a woman in public (she might become irrational) or allow a woman to exert physical strength (unseemly). Most of Wollstonecraft’s arguments are disguised as philosophical and moral conversations with Rousseau.
A Vindication of the Rights of Woman introduced me to a seraglio. I had never heard the word before.

As an aside, when Wollstonecraft talked about the overgrown child I had an ah-ha moment. I know a man-child who refuses to grow up. It all makes sense now.
As another aside, back in the late 1970s or early 80s, my parents subscribed to a number of magazines. I clearly remember a cigarette advertisement picturing a woman laughing, mouth wide open and head thrown back with a cigarette in her hand. The caption read, “You’ve Come a Long Way, Baby!” Even as a kid I remember questioning what it all meant. Were they proclaiming women now had the right to smoke? Smoke in public? Smoke that particular brand? And why the word baby?

Author fact: Everyone knows Mary Wollstonecraft is the Mary Shelley who wrote Frankenstein and in case you forgot, the Shelley is the last name of Percy Bysshe Shelley.

Book trivia: Wollstonecraft had never written a dedication before. She decided to dedicate A Vindication of the Rights of Woman to the Bishop of Autun in response to a pamphlet he wrote.

Nancy said: Pearl calls Vindication an “influential feminine essay” (More Book Lust p 146).

BookLust Twist: I am reading the unabridged republication of the 1792 London edition. From More Book Lust in the chapter called “Literary Lives: the Brits” (p 146).

I Know This Much Is True

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Lamb, Wally. I Know This Much Is True. HarperCollins, 1998.

Reason read: March is considered Family Month. Brothers are family. Read in honor of brothers everywhere.

Thomas and Dominic. Identical twins.
Dominic’s life reminded me of a country song. You know the ones where anything that could go wrong eventually does. Consider: Dominic spent his entire life worrying about three things. One, who was his father? By not knowing his father Dominic feels he does not know himself. As a child he dreamed of his biological father and fantasized about the day this mystery man would swoop in and save him and Thomas from their abusive stepfather, Ray. Two, Dominic was convinced his mother loved his brother more. Maybe she really did because of Thomas’s mental illness. On her deathbed she makes Dominic promise to look after Thomas, all the while refusing to reveal the true identity of their father. Three, Thomas’s mental illness could be hereditary and sooner or later Dominic would inherit his brother’s schizophrenia. Was he just as crazy as his brother and just not know it? All of these worries weigh on Dominic as he tries to cope. In giving up his own life to fulfill the promise he made to his mother his marriage falls apart and he quit his job as a history teacher (ironically, it is history that sets him free).
In order for this story to be successful the reader needed to be grounded in the current events of the time, otherwise Thomas’s internal angst doesn’t make sense. Eric Clapton’s son falling from a window. Desert Storm. The beating of Rodney King. The world on fire. In addition to these unsettling times, Lamb throws in some equally difficult subjects like racism, AIDS, post traumatic stress suffered by veterans, diabetes, and of course, the complicated system of treating mental health.
I deeply love flawed characters; ones who find a way to change just enough that by the end of the book they are going to be okay, even if it is only somewhat okay. They haven’t gone from devil to angel but their lives are not the disaster they once were.

As another aside, the next time I am feeling threatened by anyone I think I want to try Dominic’s trick of protection – look your tormentor directly in the eye without flinching.

Author fact: Lamb also wrote She’s Come Undone, another fantastic book.

Book trivia: this is a reread for me. I remember being intimidated by the number of pages. Some things never change.

Playlist: Aerosmith, “Age of Aquarius”, Beatles, “Beautiful Dreamer”, Bob Dylan, Bob Marley’s “One Love”, “Cool Jerk”, “Heartbreak Hotel” and “Hunka Hunka Burning Love” by Elvis, Eric Clapton, “For He’s a Jolly Good Fellow”, “Good Lovin'”, “Happy Birthday”, “Hot Diggity Dog Diggity”, “I Shot the Sherriff”, Indigo Girls, John Lennon’s “Instant Karma”, “Marzy Doats” The Monkees, “My Country ‘Tis of Thee”, “Night Moves”, “Nineteenth Nervous Breakdown”, Olivia Newton-John, Question Mark and the Mysterians’s “Ninety-Six Tears”, Rolling Stones, Sam the Sham and the Pharaoh’s “Wooly Bully”, “The Boys are Back in Town”, “Three blind Mice”, Tina Turner’s “What’s Love Got To Do With It?”, Verdi, “Wild Thing”, Willie Nelson’s “Heartland”, and Yanni.

Nancy said: Pearl called I Know This Much Is True an interesting portrait of therapists. She said more than that but you should check out Book Lust or More Book Lust for more.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “Shrinks and Shrinkees” (p 221). Also from More Book Lust in the chapter called “Oh! Brother” (p 180).

Learning to Swim

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Dugan, Shayla. Learning to Swim. Egret Lake Books, 2024.

Reason read: as a member of the Early Review Program for LibraryThing, I get to read some pretty cool books. This is one of them.

Coming off of reading It Was Her New York by Moen, I thought Learning to Swim would be a hard act to follow. The premises appeared to be similar: daughters taking care of their mothers. But that is where the similarities end. Whereas Moen’s story is gritty nonfiction, Dugan’s Learning to Swim tells the fictionalized story of the “sandwich” generation – a woman taking care of her child at the same time as taking care of her parent. Gabrielle moved back home to care for former Olympic swimmer mother, Ida, who needs bypass surgery. In stereotypical fashion the two have never really gotten along. At the same time Gabrielle has thoughtlessly dragged her thirteen year old daughter, Juniper, along completely uprooting her life as well. I don’t think it is a spoiler alert to say through learning to swim, grandmother, mother and daughter learn to accept each other. The ending of the book was very appropriate.
My only complaint is that Learning to Swim could have been a longer book. Dugan does such a great job sketching the characters and making them come alive. By giving them histories she creates depth, but she could have gone further with them. Here is an example: Gabrielle doesn’t know how she likes her eggs. It totally reminded me of a scene right out of Runaway Bride starring Julia Roberts. She didn’t know how she liked her eggs because she was too busy trying to please others. Here is a better example: Gabrielle’s half-brother Chad refused to step up to take care of his mother despite living closer. When he does finally enter the picture it is out of greed and exaggerated indifference to Gabrielle’s grief. Nothing explained the disconnect except to say that the half-siblings were not close growing up.

Character question – Ida’s mother died and wasn’t found for three days because Ida and her father were at an out of state swim meet. Were there no phones? Neither daughter nor husband thought to check in with the woman? At the very least wouldn’t they want to tell her how the meet was going?

As an aside, there was one line that had me scratching my head. Gabrielle said her patience gauge was at “437”. What exactly does that number mean? Have you ever read the poem by Shel Silverstein about the number of teeth in a wild boar’s mouth? The narrator calmly tells someone he will not be impressed by any number thrown at him because he doesn’t know anything about the number of teeth in a wild boar’s mouth. Same with the patience gauge at 437.

As another aside, I loved that someone ate a peanut butter and pickle sandwich. That is my all time favorite.

Book trivia: this was my first book with a AI disclaimer on training.

Living to Tell the Tale

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Marquez, Gabriel Garcia. Living to Tell the Tale. Alfred A. Knopf, 2003.

Reason read: Gabriel Garcia Marquez was born in March. Read in his honor.

If you like Gabriel Garcia Marquez as a writer, you are going to love his autobiography. What a different world Gabriel Garcia Marquez lived in. From an early age he was exposed to unheard of violence. Imagine! It was common for men (and women) to swagger around with a revolver in their waistbands. The headless horseman still rides through my dreams. Marquez writes with such honesty and clarity it is if you are standing beside him when he is so poor he cannot pay for a copy of his first published story. He needs to ask a reader if he is done with his copy. Time and time again Marquez pulls back the curtain on some of his childhood secrets. Imagine the embarrassment he felt in boarding school knowing he would talk in his sleep.
Living to Tell the Tale is not only a first installment of a man’s autobiography, but it is also a peek into the mind of a budding writer; tales about Marquez’s mother and how she was his first character and her life, his first plot; the starting of a cultural weekly to combine sports with literature. Crawl inside the mind of this extraordinary writer’s mind and you will find a man who cared deeply for perfection. Example: the difference between Madrilenian and Caribbean dialects can alter the text’s meaning considerably. Marquez had copies of such an incorrect edit destroyed.
Living to Tell the Tale only takes the reader up to Marquez’s life in the 1950s when he proposes to his wife, but there are glimpses into his future such as in 1962 when In Evil Hour won a novel competition and he celebrated the birth of his second son.

Questions I wanted to ask – did Marquez grow up to be sexist because, in his culture, women were not allowed in offices and workshops? Or because he learned about sex in an unconventional way (according to him)?

One of the most beautiful phrases in Living to Tell the Tale was when Marquez was building a character in one of his novels. He used a lover from his past saying, “I rescued her from my memory…” (p 234). Here is another phrase I loved, “…I took off the strait jacket of my shyness” (p 337).

Author fact: Marquez was misdiagnosed as having pneumonia when it was actually lymphatic cancer. He later died of pneumonia.

Book trivia: Living to Tell the Tale was supposed to be the first in a three-volume set. the rest of the story never got published.

Setlist: “After the Ball is Over”, “Anapola”, Angel Maria Camacho y Cano, Bach, “Hard Days Night” by the Beatles, Beethoven, Bela Bartok’s “The Autumn of the Patriarch”, Brahms, Carlos Gardel’s “Cuesta abajo”, Chopin, Corelli, Daniel Santos, “El cisne”, Haydn, Joaquin Vega, Maurico Anaias, Migelito Valdes, Mozart, Preludes of Debussy, Schoenberg, Sonora Matancera, Tona lea Negra, Vivaldi, and “When the Ball is Over”.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “Hail, Columbia!” (p 90).

Turtle Moon

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Hoffman, Alice. Turtle Moon. Berkley Trade, 1997.

Reason read: Alice Hoffman was born in the month of March. Read in her honor.

In a nutshell: a woman runs away from her abusive husband, taking her infant daughter to Florida. It is not a spoiler alert to say she doesn’t stay hidden for long and winds up dead. The daughter goes missing. Another woman in the same apartment complex has a surly son who has also gone missing. Police think this is not a coincidence. Now mom needs to find the identity of the murdered woman, find the missing baby, and clear her son’s name in the process. The magical realism in this story is an angel sitting up in a tree. This other-worldly figure of bright light doesn’t factor into the story all that much. As an aside (albeit a snarky one), another element of magical realism could be the jetlag Lucy claims to experience traveling from Florida to New York…which are in the same time zone.

Confessional: I am a stickler for human nature that makes sense. I didn’t get Julian Cash at all. I got Lucy Rosen even less. I’ll tackle Julian first. As a former foster kid, Julian is riddled by guilt over a car accident he survived, but his cousin did not. Hence the angel in the tree. Julian is now a K9 cop with very little to say. The chip on his shoulder is the size of a boulder. He has so many issues that he is described like an exaggerated caricature. As mentioned before, a young mother has been murdered and her under-two-year-old baby has gone missing. It’s up to Julian and his vicious dogs to find the infant. Except, Julian falls for Lucy and decides he needs to drive her car from Florida to New York. And speaking of Lucy. Her angsty son has been fingered for the crime so she figures the only way to clear his name is to find the real killer. She doesn’t know the baby-mama’s name but what a coincidence! She was married to someone Lucy went to high school with in upstate New York! The story really started to fall apart when Lucy traced her Florida neighbor back to her hometown because I didn’t care for Lucy’s treatment of her ex-husband, Evan. Evan has moved on and is even dating someone new, yet Lucy doesn’t see anything wrong with 1) staying with Evan, 2) borrowing his car (because remember, she left hers in Florida), 3) making Evan take her to their high school reunion (?!) even though he had plans to take the girlfriend), and 4) inviting Julian into Evan’s home to take a shower and have breakfast.

Lines I liked: none. I cannot quote without permission.

Author fact: I have officially finished the Hoffman collection within the Challenge: Blue Diary, Illumination Night, White Horses, and The Drowning Season join Turtle Moon on the finished shelf.

Playlist: Guns N’ Roses, and Vic Damone.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “A…is For Alice” (p 1).